Pages

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Tuesday's Tip- All About Tomatoes

Tuesday’s tip is here. I have been getting mails and
comments mentioning that this section in my blog is very informative and useful
and I must write Tuesday’s tip without fail :-) :-). So the wait is over!

Today it is all about tomatoes. Tomato is one such ingredient
that is used in Indian cooking a lot and I can’t think of anything if there are
no tomatoes in my kitchen. Summer is the time when tomatoes are available in
abundance and one must take full advantage of this season. By the way did you know that there are over
10,000 varieties of tomatoes? Tomato is a very healthy vegetable which has good
water content, is rich in Vitamin C and have zero cholesterol level. That is too much of gyan from my side :P Now let us see the tips.

How to select Tomatoes:

Buying and selecting is
the real trick. Choose the one that is firm, full and deep bright red in colour.
Avoid the one that is mushy and or even slightly green –both of them will lack
in flavour. Don't worry about tomatoes with weird shapes. Even cracked skin is
okay, but leaking juice and soft spots are not. Another test is the
smell; prefer one that has strong earthy odour- stronger the smell means better
tomato. Shun the ones with no smell- they are complete no no.

How to store Tomatoes:

Tomatoes are delicate and
fragile and must be handled properly. Refrigerating tomatoes damages the membranes inside the fruit walls,
causing the tomato to lose flavour, so
the best place to store tomatoes is at room temperature. Take off their wine
stems and keep them upside down, this will help tomatoes stay fresh for long. If tomatoes are not quite ripe, leave them in a brown paper bag
for a couple of days.

How to preserve Tomatoes:

Whenever we think of
preserving jellies and jams comes to our mind. But here is an easy way -just
freeze the whole tomatoes. Yes! If you have space in the freezer just put
tomatoes in a Ziploc bag and freeze them; it stays fresh for long.

Hope these tips help.
Please comment if you have any tip/s related to tomatoes. * Disclaimer :::: Not all the information mentioned above is my own and some of it are taken from various books and online sources like Google including the pics. My pics will have my logo on them , rest all are taken randomly from Google

Thanks for the timely tips. Ny favourite space-saving way of preserving toms is make pasata. You might be interested in our post on the health benefits of tomatoes: http://theyogivegetarian.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/tomatoes-are-good-for-your-heart.html